A new book in my book stack

Okay I usually don’t post about books. But in this case I have too. A few days ago amazon pointed me to books I might be interested in. And this was one of them. So I read the first few pages on amazon. Indicating nothing new. So I started a little research on the evil search engine. And i found this little link. The author really got me.

So I read almost the hole book until my local bookstore called me and tell me, it has arrived. Yes, that’s so old school. But I like that bookstore. And want them to stay. Nothing against Amazon. And since it was shipped in a amazon packet everything’s fine for me.

It’s hard for me to articulate, but: “Thanks Google”

Yes, I mean I wouldn’t have bought that book without the chance to have a deeper look in it. Most of the time books about agile software development tell you stories about administrivialities. This book don’t. (mostly) Ok to be honest the author already cached me on page 3 telling:

“every cool kid is doing it, Google, Yahoo, Symantec, Microsoft and the list goes on.“

… But most of them don’t get it, or barely deserved the name agile …

Another question this book pointed me too. “Given a company with 10 developers, means almost 1 or 2 and a bunch of googlescripters, could that company be agile?” Think about that. A team of 6 or max. 8 developers is more productive than a team of hundreds of developers. But how many people do you need to be agile. Can one developer be agile in the developing process? Or is it just cool to call yourself agile even if you’re not.

My subjective feeling tells me, even a one man business can be agile. But the development lifecycle is not agile. Due to the fact that one guy, can’t develop more than one thing at the same time. Back to today’s question and that is really the reason for this post.

I've got a email yesterday from a developer which was complaining about a project. Problem here, problem there, problem anywhere and the mail tells: “the technology is bullshit.” – Oh, yes it is! From my point of view and experience. But I knew it wasn’t the technology he was complaining about. So I answered him with the new learned success definitions and offered him an “exit-strategy” turns out, that was the last thing he really wanted. So he had to make a point. “Ok I need a consultant, because learning it the hard way, and find out everything by myself, is less productive.” That’s something I can work with.

A “program manager” has to read between the lines. But even the best can not read minds. So brings me back to communication. When someone tells you: “bla bla bla, bullshit”. Don’t ask the question why! Because with a “WHY” you will get the technical answers you don’t want to hear. Ask for the real problem. And that Ladies and Gentleman is hard to do. Because, you must do it indirectly and in a way the other party is not offended. But if you can figure it out. And if it is a easy solvable one, like this -everything’s fine.

But what if not? The next step is to look closer to that person. If he is becoming angry we really have a problem. Turns out that angry is just a replacement feeling for fear. Because fear is not allowed in our daily business that is the logical response. Because anger is a allowed feeling in some companies. Then you really have to talk about a "exit strategy" and a new position. If you work with gifted minds and cool developers, you better stick to them, and look for a new job. Don't let them go and even more important stop them before they get a burn out or even worse.

Note to myself: “Find a good consultant, today!” Look closer to that project!